So, naturally, Johnny Pesky couldn't even die without becoming an indictment of the team and the locker room culture, whatever the fuck that means. Pesky's Monday morning funeral was attended by over 100 employees but just four current players, and this is now a capital-T Thing, and can be used for all sorts of sweeping pronouncements about this team and their moral character (and nothing at all about the team having landed at 4 a.m., and most of them having only met Pesky a couple times in passing).

But this really isn't about Johnny, whose departure was treated as a loss of royalty, which is what he was to this city, as beloved as anyone who ever represented Boston in the eyes of the outside world.

No, this is about the players; individually, they might have had splendid reasons to be among the missing at St. John the Evangelist Church in Swampscott, but collectively, they're not looking so good this morning.

How ironic they'd blow this one.

After Tuesday's magnificent pre-game tribute, including the thrilling playing of taps, and the lump-in-the-throat spectacle of 40 players wearing No. 6, busloads of this town's big-leaguers showing up for a last goodbye was a fastball down the pike, ripe for blasting, a can't-miss moment.